3. Nicholas Castellanos
Of the three possible additions, this was the one that would have cost the least to make happen as Castellanos only required a four-year, $64 million contract from the Cincinnati Reds.
However, this was probably the most questionable of their decisions to make as, instead of signing Castellanos, the team decided to trade for Nomar Mazara.
While it’s certainly possible that trade could work out, Mazara doesn’t exactly have a track record of success in the big leagues, He hasn’t even had a season where he had a 1.0 fWAR yet.
Castellanos, 27, would have been a major addition to the lineup in 2020 after hitting .289/.337/.525 with 27 home runs and 73 RBI to give himself a 121 wRC+ and 2.8 fWAR this past season.
His fWAR was lower due to the fact that his defense has not been good over the course of his career.
With that being said, he did show some improvement in 2019 with -9 DRS as compared to -19 in 2018 while also improving his UZR to -4.4 as compared to his abysmal -12.9 UZR in the year prior.
Even if the team determined that he wasn’t capable of playing right field every day, they could have signed him for their DH spot. However, they instead chose to sign Edwin Encarnacion.
Mazara and Encarnacion could certainly work out for the team in 2020, but I also believe that Castellanos would have been a big-time addition for the team.
The good news is that they might get another crack at Castellanos next offseason as his contract contains an opt-out after the 2020 season as detailed by Jeff Passan of ESPN.
That allows the White Sox to evaluate Mazara and, if he doesn’t succeed, they can simply do a course correction after this season.